Leonie's Lament
by LockePhilote
Summary: A rewriting of Leonie and M!Byleth's B Support (the very unfortunately timed one) where Leonie gets chewed out for her behavior by Byleth, in fulfillment of a Reddit request. Spoilers for Chapter 9 of Three Houses. Rated M for swearing, violence, and scenes depicting suicide. Picture by cantradrawsstuff
1. Breaking Byleth

_A/N: This started due to a Reddit comment thread where someone asked to see a version of Leonie's B Support with Byleth where she gets the chewing out she deserves. I answered the call for that fanfic and churned out this mess you see below. Please note that this is Chapter 1 of 2, maybe 3 (that can change if I decide to rework other supports, not that many in 3 Houses beyond this one really need it.) _

I don't know if it was the half flask of backwoods booze, downed while curled up in bed, the grief that I was trying to drown out with it, or the guilt of my resentment that led there, but the day after Captain Jeralt's death, I found myself outside his son's, my professor's, room, with the beginning of an apology heavy in my mind. The previous night's storm had let up for the most part, leaving behind a faint, misting drizzle that cooled my skin.

_What in the Saints are you doing here, Leonie_, I asked myself as I gathered my courage to knock on the door. _You're probably the last person he wants to see, the blathering idiot who can't help but bring up his father every other sentence, and you know that. You are only going to fuck this up_, _and then you'll be stuck with Alois as your only brother apprentice for the rest of your life_.

For better or for worse, I was spared the burden of knocking when Byleth opened the door. Except for a red patchiness to his cheeks and a more solemn air than usual, he seemed exactly the same as always.

"Hey, Professor," I said awkwardly, unprepared to talk with him despite standing outside his door for half an hour.

"Got a minute?" I continued, cringing inwardly at how unnatural and stiff I sounded, even though I had rehearsed this exchange in my head for most of the morning.

Byleth's expression became blanker than usual, but then, for a brief moment, I thought I saw something flicker on and off in his face, a ghost of an emotion, killed by Byleth's trademark detachment.

"Of course. Come on in," he said, stepping out of the doorway so I could enter.

Unlike Professor Hanneman's well-furnished study, or Professor Manuela's well-stocked infirmary, Byleth's room was as sparse as a student's, with the only distinguishing features being the white carpeting of Knight of Seiros rather than the red, gold, or blue of a student's house and the bulletin board, magically linked to the other's around campus so that he could see and prepare to meet students' needs while getting ready for the day.

Byleth motioned towards a wooden seat near a small table, which I gladly sat in while he stood near the now closed door.

"Look, I'm sorry I snapped at you. I didn't mean to lose my temper I was rude to you. I should have known better," I started, almost unable to look him in the eye, yet forcing myself to. He deserved an apology like this, deserved this attempt to clear the air between them, to have someone who wasn't as odd as Rhea, as annoying as Alois, or as heartbroken as Jeralt's mercenaries, who were currently making a valiant attempt to rid the town of the evil of alcohol, there for him to talk about his father with.

"It's all right," he said in his usual monotone; it didn't quite lack inflection, but rather had inflection without emotion. His voice went high and low in the right places to sound natural, but beyond that, there was little, if any, depth to it.

Normally, I could deal with that, even though the way Byleth reacted to things, or rather didn't react to things, frightened me a bit, and was nothing like the intentional detachment his father had. Where I could tell that Jeralt kept himself at a distance to prevent his line of work from destroying him, Byleth almost felt like a piece of art, or perhaps a puppet, a something we tried to attach emotions to rather than a someone who could let us know what he was feeling. But that was ok, as despite all of that, there was still something comforting about his presence. Being around him was like being huddled up near a fire on a snowy winter day; despite the biting cold all around, you felt as warm as the hottest summer day.

Today, though, today… it was all I could do not to smack him. Jeralt was dead, I'm a wreck and wanted nothing more to check on him, apologize to him, and comfort him, and here he is, sure, more solemn, a bit teary eyed, but otherwise… fine. Normal, or as normal as he could be.

"I thought you might say that. In that way, you're just like Captain Jeralt. You accept other people. You don't let petty details get under your skin," I said gingerly. It took everything I had to prevent his father's name from becoming an acid barb, but somehow I managed to keep my rage hidden, masking it with concern.

I shifted in my seat, feigning discomfort to hide the deep, steadying breaths I was taking to calm myself. _Maybe this is the only way he knows how to express himself_, I told myself. _When Jeralt told me to, in the event of his death, be as loyal to his son as I was to him, he did tell me Byleth was a bit… muted, but I never expected… this_.

"How did you know my father?" Byleth asked, interrupting my reverie as he took the other seat.

"Well, when I was a kid, I kind of latched on to him. I've been calling myself his apprentice ever since. He spent some time in the village I grew up in," I sighed, rage soothed by childhood memories flickering through my mind. One person, I noticed for the first time, was conspicuously absent from them, however.

"Actually, you weren't with him back then. Why not?" I asked, suddenly curious.

Byleth's face assumed the passive, nearly thoughtful look that was the closest thing he had to emotion.

"I don't remember," he said simply after a few moments.

"Huh. Maybe he left you with a relative or something," I offered weakly, remembering from what Jeralt told me that he had no living relatives, or at least none that he was aware of, anyway. _Perhaps he had been with the mercenaries and I didn't notice? I did only have eyes for Jeralt back then, and if he was actively trying to hide his son from prying eyes, I never would have paid the slightest attention to him_.

I shrugged, then continued.

"Anyway, back then, Jeralt's job was to deal with poachers—well, they were bandits—but we called them poachers. Nobody in the village could stand up to them. But your dad?" I could feel a strange flurry of emotions, gratitude, frustration, and joy, mixing deep within my chest. "Your dad, he took them on like it was nothing. I was so impressed! All I could think was how amazing mercenaries were. I'd lived in that tiny village my whole life, so to me, Captain Jeralt was nothing short of a legend."

_More than a legend, a hero even. Without him… _ _I would be nothing_.

"So I went right up to him, and I told him I was going to be his apprentice. He didn't stick around long after that, but he did teach me a lot while he was with us. Tactics, strategy, training routines—it was all so new and exciting! So after he left, I kept at it. Kept training. Just like he taught me," I finished, finding it harder and harder to keep my emotions in check as I spoke. Jeralt had done so much for me, more than he realized, and I had worked myself nearly to death to get to the point I was at now, yet… Professor Byleth could, barely trying, master everything his father had to offer, merely because he had more time with him, more attention, more care.

"I'm glad you got to see him again," Byleth replied

"Me too. I always planned to meet him again-" _I wish we'd never parted_ "once I became a top-tier mercenary… But I'm just glad I got to see him. To thank him properly and all. I've spent my whole life working to become a great mercenary like your father."

"There were so many times when I wanted to ask his advice, but I couldn't. I just had to make do. That's how I've made it this far. Just hard work, all on my own." I smiled, but the years of loneliness rose in my throat, scorching the backs of my smiling teeth, until those dark thoughts won out and my grin burned away.

"But then you come along... And it's like you don't appreciate Captain Jeralt at all, or how lucky you were to have him around your whole life!" The accusation, born of my deepest insecurities, flew out before I could stop it, though, to be honest, I'm not sure if I really wanted to. How could he sit here and seemingly not feel anything, anything at all, after his father's death! How could his father, who meant so much to so many, mean so little to him?! What would it take to get him to feel anything?

"Ugh!" I snorted, disgust creeping into my voice. "I thought that things would change now, but this… it still really bothers me! You might be his kid, but I'm still his best apprentice! Got it?!"

My yelled words briefly echoed around us, then the room fell silent, Byleth's face as blank as ever. Immediately, I knew I had crossed another line, this one far more serious than the first. Then, his father was alive, and I was feeling competitive and jealous, and the possibility of forgiveness was present. Now… in those echoes, I didn't hear a competitive girl, I heard an ungrateful bitch, one who came out of some ill founded need to govern a man's relationship with his father, to make sure he loved him enough as I thought he should have. Yet, the anger within me refused to die, fed by my deeply held suspicion that Byleth didn't truly feel anything after all, that even those brief glimpses of emotion we occasionally got were, if not for show, then ungainly attempts by a sociopath to imitate human emotion. I sat there, unyielding, daring him to respond, almost hoping he would show some, any emotion and prove me wrong.

"Last night, when my father died, was the first time I cried in a long time, perhaps ever," Byleth said quietly. The hint of desperation in his voice sent a shiver down my spine and snuffed out my anger, leaving empty ashes in its place. He sounded lost, scared, and here I was… tormenting him. I opened my mouth to speak, to try and make any of this right, but he cut me off.

"I held him as he died, and all I could manage to do was shed a few tears. These red marks on my cheeks," Byleth pointed, "are not from me crying, but from me trying to cry more, to feel more. I hate how filtered my emotions feel, hate that I can't even bring myself to cry now, to feel anything more than generally sad about my father dying in arms!"

Byleth's voice slowly rose in volume as he spoke, until by the end he was shouting, the first time I've ever heard him yell outside of battle. He stood up, knocking over his chair in the process, his face contorting into his first ever attempt at a scowl.

"But now… now, I'm angry. How dare you Leonie. How dare you come to me, today of all days, and tell me how I didn't appreciate him. He's the only person I've ever felt love for, the only person to, up till now, care about me. Of course I appreciate him. I'm scared, Leonie, terrified of how I am going to live my life without him. He meant everything to me, was one of the only things in my life, and now he's gone." He slammed his fist down on the table, shaking a few books off it. Any trace of hurt was now gone from his face; in its place was a cruel, uncaring gaze, different from the indifferent expression Byleth wore when cutting people down on the battlefield. This was Rhea's expression when passing judgement, the look that said that you were nothing more than an insect, less than an insect, that you were defiling Fódlan by merely living.

"You were never his squire, or even his apprentice. You were a poor village girl he pitied enough to teach a few things, nothing more," Byleth continued, the new, Rhea-esque gleam in his eyes keeping my gaze trapped despite the tears streaming down my face. "Meeting him might have changed your life, but for him, it was Tuesday. Whatever love you felt from him was an illusion, nothing more."

At that, something inside of me broke. I had been able to sit through most of that, watch as someone who, despite my annoyance at his lack of emotion and jealousy of his family, imploded due to me, due to the things I said, due to my own inability to leave well enough alone and put my psychodrama aside. It hurt to see this, hurt something deep inside within me and spawned a dragon, festering with guilt and self-loathing, inside of me, but I could take it. I would cry, and my self hatred would grow ever larger, and I would try and fail to make to make this right again, starting the cycle anew, but I could survive.

That though… that was everything I've ever feared about myself, every teenage insecurity, every time I trained till it hurt not for the training, but for the hurt, to give myself the pain I deserved for being a useless drain on my entire village and a sorry excuse for a daughter, and every time I considered walking away from those I was with, disappearing into the wild, and seeing how long I could last before I died, balled up into a few biting comments. If there was a light within all of us, as Seteth occasionally preached, … that caused the light in me to go out.

_A/N: And that's a wrap for chapter one. A bit of an abrupt ending, but I am tired and wanted to get the main part of what I promised out tonight. Reviews are welcome, especially on whether Byleth's sociopathy is working or not. _

_Also, it is good to be back. If you look at my account, you'll see how long it has been since I've last posted, and I have to say... I missed this feeling. _

_Finally, I should have chapter two up sometime over the next few days. I have it half written, but decided to cut it off here for now as, again, tired and currently suffering through an infected wisdom tooth. Not fun. _


	2. Sothis' Soothing

_A/N: Switching POV here to Byleth, as Leonie completely breaking down is more interesting and impactful to observe than to experience from her POV, I believe. There's only so many times you can say "I feel filled with self-hatred" before it gets old, and to truly do justice to something as terrible as a mental break is something I don't feel I can do right now. _

_Also, changed the timeline a little bit. Byleth retrieved the journal immediately, not after a few days; after Monica's betrayal, his trust would be at an all-time low._

There was a screeching, inhuman sound, like a wyvern being gelded, then the light in Leonie's eyes went out. Her tears, her movements, even her breathing stopped, except for a small tremble in her hands and wrists. My rage and frustration evaporated, and for a brief, fear-filled moment, I thought she was dying or dead, that I had broken something inside her physically as well as mentally; then, her breathing resumed, her shaking hands now tightly clenched fists.

"Byleth…" came a voice within my head, compassionate and scared.

_"Sothis… how do I fix this? Can I turn back time, take back what I said?" _I thought frantically at her, my mind racing like it had last night, like it did when Jeralt… when my father was stabbed.

I don't like hurting people. On the battlefield, I go for the cleanest kill possible. Seeing people cling to life with shattered bodies and fatal wounds causes something within me to twist and ache. My brutality is born of mercy, not hatred.

This… I did this, though. I could have ended this cleanly, but I went for pain. I couldn't let what she said go by unanswered, not then, not after what happened… but my father would be ashamed to see me twist the knife in, to act, as he described her in his journal, like Rhea.

"You shouldn't, not yet. Not until you have no choice," Sothis replied, appearing in her usual corner. "If you do go back and fix this… you'll still remember doing this to her. You'll remember this as your first time expressing emotion, being only able to fix it by going back in time, and you'll close yourself off even more."

Her voice began to break.

"I don't want that, I don't think you want that, and I know Leonie doesn't want that, either. I think her jealousy was born, in part, from your lack of emotions," she cut off my response with an imperious finger, the cracks in her voice betraying her otherwise calm demeanor.

"I am not defending her. In fact, I think you were handling it well at first, but when you fell to anger… you went too far." She put her finger down, then continued. "I am merely saying that, for whatever reason, she cares deeply about your father, and probably about you too. I don't think she came here to be… how would Petra put it… a 'not good female dog,' but something in her can't stand seeing your father not openly loved, and it brings out the worst in her."

I mulled over what Sothis said. She was right. There must be a reason behind her behavior, behind her love of my father beyond what I know. Knowing this academy, this world, it is something dark and hidden, something powerful enough to drive a poor village girl to go jump through the necessary hoops to come to Garreg Mach on the off chance she would see my father again.

_"Do you think… maybe, if I find out the real reason, the deeper reason she loved… loves my father so much, I could fix this?" _I asked Sothis, my usual confidence back. Above all, I want to help people, not destroy them. I have a knack for shepherding people through difficult times on the battlefield; part of the reason I said yes to Rhea was I wanted to see if I can do it in a different setting, too.

"No, at least not yet. That part will come later, after…"

_"After?"_

"After you truly open yourself up to her. When she saw your sorrow, for a brief second, she smiled; not because she was happy to see you sad, but because she wanted to see you feel, I think, and be there for you," Sothis stated simply, her hesitant smile showing she knew exactly how difficult this would be for me.

_"… If this is the only way."_

"It is."

_"I'm… I'm scared. This is all so new and strange to me. How do I go about this?"_

Suddenly, she was there, her hand on my shoulder, a few of her ghost-like fingers phasing into me, leaving a slight tickling sensation in their wake. I found that comforting, somehow.

"I'll guide you, like I do through everything else," her grin turned mischievous. "I'm walking the long road with you, remember? I won't lead you astray."

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw blood began to trickle from Leonie's hands. Sothis gasped softly, but before she could say anything, I was there.

Leonie did not react at I placed my hands over hers, nor when I jabbed my thumbs between her thumb and pointer fingers, causing her hands to spasm open. Her nails, sharper and longer than I thought, had torn open her palms, leaving wounds deep enough to require bandaging.

"_Sothis, let me know if she tries anything while I grab some supplies."_

I stepped over to my quick bag, a small satchel that every mercenary kept stocked with basic necessities in case they needed to quickly leave an area. I navigated it by touch, finding my stowed medical supplies within a moment.

"Her hands are still open," Sothis said as I grabbed the jug of water off my bedside table.

_"Good. Now… I need a disinfectant."_

"There's your father's flask, under your bed."

_"Oh… the irony_," I thought to her as I crawled down and retrieved the flask. My father loved clear liquor, as much for the taste as for the utility in situations like this. _Thanks … dad._

I returned to Leonie and, after gently taking hold of her right hand, began to wash the blood away with the water, which still elicited no reaction from her. She was still freely bleeding, but I was able to get enough of it off that I could begin disinfecting the wound.

The scent of the alcohol caused her to stir slightly, but it was the sting that truly brought her out of her catatonic state.

"Ouch… that hurts like hell," Leonie said weakly, her eyes still dim. "Professor… I… oh Seiros, my hands… your carpet… I… did I do that?"

Unsure how to respond, I simply nodded and kept cleaning.

"Don't just nod, you idiot!" Sothis yelled, too late.

"I'm so sorry… I'll clean this up right away, then leave… I'm so sorry," Leonie said, moving to stand up. My commanding glare froze her in her tracks, however, and she sat back down, trembling a bit.

"Now… talk to her, like we discussed before," Sothis prodded.

_"How?" _I asked, not wanting to mess up again.

"Start by making sure she's ok. I swear to me, Byleth, sometimes I really wonder how you survived social situations up till this point," Sothis sighed dramatically.

_"My father did all the talking_," I replied.

"Right… I'm sorry… I forgot" Sothis said, apologetic, sincerity replacing sarcasm.

"… Are you ok, Leonie?" I asked, unsure what tone to take, or how to even take one, and ending up in my usual monotone.

She nodded yes, still trembling.

"Because… I don't think you are. Not just your hands… or even just from what I said… but from before that."

Sothis, penitence gone, had opened her mouth to interrupt, but quickly closed it, intrigued.

"Am I right?" I finished, watching as her shifted from my hands, still treating her cuts, to her feet. She didn't nod or say anything, but that reaction told me all I needed to know.

"I… I haven't been alright my entire life, or at least what I can remember of it. Most of it is a blur, the rest a montage of riding to a village, killing bandits, buying supplies, over and over again. I had no friends, no family outside my father."

I started gingerly, or as gingerly as I knew how, carefully choosing my words. By the end, however, they started coming more naturally to me, and I began to feel something.

"I've always had a hard time showing, or even feeling, emotion, as you probably guessed. I can see how others would feel emotion from things, know how I should react, but… I'm lacking something inside me. My heart, probably, as I don't have a heartbeat."

Leonie raised her head slightly at that, but otherwise stayed still. Still, I pressed onward.

"That… that doesn't mean I don't feel emotion. It is just very hard for me to, especially in the moment. Over the long term, I can feel things… love and gratitude towards my father, for example… but in the short term, I can't. Today was the first time I've ever had an outburst like that, ever expressed anything like that at all, and I'm sorry you bore the brunt of it." I took a deep breath. Explaining my… condition, that was the easy part. Now came the hard part.

"That being said, please do understand that… I loved my father. I cherished him, more than I knew how to express. What I said before was true, he was the biggest and, up till recently, only thing in my life," I started. Something similar to the scant few tears I had cried last night began to form in my eyes.

"Every day, I use the lessons he taught me. Like how to treat a wound like that," I gently touched her now bandaged hands, "or how to manage an unruly mob, whether on the battlefield or in the classroom."

My sudden touch caused Leonie to look up, and her eyes met mine.

"Professor…" she said quietly, more a breath than a word.

"And maybe… in some small way, you are right. Maybe I didn't appreciate him enough. He knew I loved him, as best I could anyway, but I never said it. Perhaps I should have. … Guess I'll never get the chance now," I finished, unsure what else more to say. In the background, I heard Sothis make a distressed sound, but I ignored it.

The same feeling I had before, the sadness I had felt prior to snapping at Leonie, was reawakening inside me. This time, though, instead of feeling the need to yell at her, or become angry with her, I merely began to cry. Not tear up, like I did last night, but, for the first time, truly cry.

_A/N: And that's it for this chapter. A bit shorter than I intended, but I wanted to get this section out so I can really get the ending down right. I have that mostly written out, actually, but there are still a few big moments to fully flesh out (namely Leonie's explanation of why __she wants to fuck Byleth's dad __ Jeralt means so much to her, and how Byleth actually manages to fix this situation)._

_I plan on having the next, and hopefully final, chapter out within the next few days. This has been a lot of fun to write, and I thank everyone who has been reading it so far for giving it a chance. _


	3. Fractured Futures

_A/N: This took longer than expected due to getting that damned wisdom tooth out, suffering from sleep issues, and being busier than expected with work and the like. I apologize, dear readers.__This next chapter is, for better of for worse, not the last. I suspect that the next one will be, however._

_Byleth is turning out to be a much more interesting character to write than expected, especially since writing him requires a lot shorter sentences than usual for me. He's like an amnesiac noir detective, almost, in how he needs to be written, and I love it._

_Finally, please note that there are passages referencing suicide in this chapter. Anyone who is uncomfortable with/triggered by those events should take care when reading this._

I half expected Leonie to put her hand on my shoulder, to try and comfort me, like I believe she intended all along, but instead, she froze and seemed to retreat further within herself.

"Professor, I'm sorry I said what I said. I… I had no right to say anything. I had no idea that, for all this time, even with Jeralt by your side, life was this difficult for you," Leonie looked up as she spoke, her voice made lifeless by crushing guilt. Her expression suggested she needed to throw up, her hunched shoulders that she wanted to collapse in on herself and die.

"I'm deeply sorry I've been a nuisance to you and your father. I… you should have this, not me. I was never his squire, or apprentice, or even temporary student… you deserve this, not me." Leonie reached around her neck and pulled a small, wooden charm over her head. She stiffly handed it to me. Not knowing what else to do, I took it.  
I held the charm in my hands for a moment, considering my next move. The patterns carved into the wood felt achingly familiar, even though, to my knowledge, this is the first time I had seen or held it. It had the same imprecise, dogged feel that everything else my father had made had to it.

Something broke within me, and I began to feel something else. Caring, maybe, or compassion. Whatever it was, it made it hurt, hurt more than any wound I had ever known, to see Leonie before me, shattered.

"Leonie…"

"I… I think I'll leave now, Professor," she said, getting up. Before I could stop her, or before I could bring myself to stop her, the door was open and she was half-way out.  
In her corner, I saw Sothis wince in pain, then a sound like shattered glass on stone. For a moment, I thought Sothis had stopped time, and I prepared myself to admit defeat and go back, unable to fix this.

But then time lurched forward again, or… at least for me, it did.

I saw Leonie, something still broken in her heart, run back to her room. My vision followed her like a ghost, and time ran forward, it's river now entirely rapids.

I think a few weeks passed, then I saw her again. She was gauntly staring at herself in the lake's shallows, image muddied by mud and her vomit. People had seen her leave my quarters; whispers abound that she had fucked my father, that with him gone she wanted to fuck me, and that my refusal had broken her.

I saw myself approach her, try to put a comforting hand on her shoulder, but she shrugged it off and, with a muttered apology, ran off again.

More time flew by. Now, she was with Manuela, her advisor. They were heatedly discussing something, Manuela frantically pointing at a pile of familiar smelling bottles.  
"Leonie… I know these are yours. Please, just tell me what is going on. We can help you… we want to help you," Manuela was almost pleading."You drink twice as much as I do, and you say I have the problem? This is nothing… my fathers… they could drink more than us combined, and still be fine."  
There was a slurred acid to Leonie's voice, and Manuela began to cry. Something else died in Leonie's eyes, then I was gone again.

I was on a battlefield, Leonie uncaringly cutting her way through unnamed hoards with my father's roughness, but not his grace. An arrow pierced her side, but instead of crying out in pain, she merely laughed as she fell, dying.

I was in a forest. There was a sickening crack, and I saw a pair of familiar boots fall and dangle before me.

I was near the gardens, watching as the Seteth and the gatekeeper tenderly pulled a figure out of the water.

I was above Leonie now, watching as she dragged a brine-soaked dagger over Kronya's bare skin. The light in her eyes was back, now with a manic edge to it as they sparkled like shards of a broken mirror.  
"Now, make me his little cat, his little lion again," Leonie said softly as Kronya tried to scream, her slit vocal cords reducing her to pathetic whimpers.

I was in a tavern, maybe an inn. Leonie was in a bed in a shadowy corner, bruised and bloody, not even whimpering as the latest in a long string of boyfriends took what he wanted from her.

I was in a different tavern, Leonie's back to me, hair pooled before her arms cradling her head on the counter before her. The door creaked open, and I was there, slipping the bartender a few coins before carrying her back to her room. The me carrying her out glanced into my eyes, and I knew that this was my penance in this possibility, the only way she'd bear to be near me and the only way I could help her.

I saw her die in hundreds of ways, mostly by her own hand, intentional or not, sometimes in battle, always too young, always friendless. When she didn't die, her life was broken, almost always irreparably. Even at her best, she was a shadow of her old self.

I had seen and dealt death, broken people with the deaths of others. I could watch most die with nary a flicker of emotion. But this… this nearly broke me, almost as my father's death had. As ill-equipped as someone like me was to pass judgement on anyone, and despite her selfishness, her focus on my father above all else… she did not deserve these futures. Any of them would be a tragedy, a good person wasted. To see all of them was to watch a calamity unfold.

_Is this what Sothis experienced as a god, if she was a god? Is this what it is truly like to be on both sides of time?_ I asked myself as Leonie died again, a penniless drunkard of a mercenary gored by a boar as she tried to feed her starving village one last time.

How does she survive this, and what does she expect me to do with this?

Then… it hit me. At first, I had thought that this all due to what I said, or didn't say, that if I didn't break her that day, none of this would have happened. Thinking back on it for a bit, however… it became clear that the warning signs were there before. The obsession with my father, with proving herself better than me; the drinking, smuggled sips she thought no one knew about; and the way she glossed over her past with generalities… she was wounded long before me. I merely twisted the knife in further.

Her hurts. Her past. There were clues in the future, clues that Sothis could show me without sending us careening into the past, and if I found them… I could prevent these futures. I could save her. I wanted to save her. Before, though I felt for her and wanted to help her, it was just another professorial crisis, one brought on by issues close to home for me, but a standard crisis none the less. Even damaged as she was… I knew she deserved what I said, and thought that she could get over it with a bit of prompting and honesty. I was harsh, but I was angry, angry for the first time ever. She would understand.

Now… something was stirring inside of me. I wanted to save her, needed to save her. If I couldn't save my father… I could at least save her.

"Sothis… I know what to do now. Bring me back," I whispered. There was a horrifying, backwards sound, and the futures before my eyes had stopped. I blinked once, twice, and time resumed its normal flow.

"Stop, little lion," I said, just loud enough for Leonie to hear. Sothis, floating next to Leonie, smiled tiredly at me, then collapsed into the corner, asleep. I was on my own now.

Leonie stopped, then turned towards me, her movements jagged, eyes wide.

"How… how do you know that name?!"

_A/N: And... once again, here we are at the end of a chapter. Next one will be the final chapter, at least for this tale. I'm really enjoying this pairing (not as a ship, mind you, but as siblings, or uncle/niece, or some other familiar relationship.) I might write a few more fics in this vein, with Byleth dropping in on Leonie in her various endings._

_Raphael and Felix are especially ripe for an exploration like this, though Claude and Seteth would also be fascinating. "Anyway, hope you enjoyed this! Reviews are welcome and encouraged, and I hope you will all keep reading!_


	4. Leonie's Lament

_A/N: Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) this is not the last chapter. _

_I hoped it would be, but the wrap up to the events here felt like it deserved its own chapter._

This one is my own take/true expansion on Leonie's backstory. Trigger warning for suicide and suicide attempts.

"Professor… how do you know that name," she asked again softly, walking back into the room.

"Stay, and I'll tell you all I can," I said. Seeing she still looked like she wanted to bolt, I added, "Jeralt would want you to stay. If not for yourself, stay for him."

Her face twisted in pain, but finally, she reentered the room and sat back down at the table. Glancing outside to ensure no one had noticed us, I closed the door.

Too worn out to walk to the table, I sat in front of the door, blocking her exit, and rubbed the bridge of my nose. Even I, unsocialized as I am, knew it was a bad idea to lock girls, especially girls you had power over, in your room with you, but in this case it couldn't be helped. I had to get to the bottom of this, for my sake and Leonie's. After a deep, steadying breath, I turned to Leonie.

She looked horrible, face streaked with tears, bandages on her hands slowly getting soaked with blood, her eyes still dead. Not dead like mine used to be, but… dead like Marianne's, maybe. She hated herself now, or maybe she always did, but could only express it now.

"Professor…" she began falteringly.

"I owe you an apology. More than an apology, maybe, a lifetime of begging for forgiveness. My actions today, and in general towards you… have not been kind, or becoming of a student here, let alone one who wants to walk in a hero's footsteps. If you wish to go to Seteth and have me expelled…"

"For what?" I interrupted, confused.

"For… for yelling at a professor, a beloved professor at that, the day after his father's death? For having the arrogance to assume my pain was yours, that my life should be yours, that my dreams were more worthy than yours. For… I don't know, being a fucking bitch?" Leonie exclaimed, frustrated. She then took a deep breath and fell back into her reduced state.

"I no longer feel worthy of being here. Perhaps I never was, but regardless… I think it would be for the best if I left."

I sighed.

"Leonie… I am not going to kick you out of the academy."

Leonie opened her mouth to protest, but a stern finger silenced her.

"You," I stopped for a moment, gathering my thoughts. "You've punished yourself enough right now. As much as I am hurting… you too are hurting now. I was right with what I said before, wasn't I. My father was truly special to you. He wasn't just some girlish crush or heroic icon, right?"

Leonie nodded no.

"Please… tell me what he truly was to you, why he gave you this necklace. Sadness is new to me, and I am already sick of it. I hate feeling like this," I said bitterly. My mind went back to Leonie torturing Kronya; despite my no pain policy, I am not sure if I would have stopped her, had I truly been there.

"I… tell me a story of my father. Tell me how he changed your life. I want to feel something, anything else right now. I want to help you, Leonie," I said. Something changed in her expression.

"Help me do that?"

We sat silent for a minute. Leonie rocked back and forth in the chair, clearly warring with herself on what to do. Finally, she spoke.

"Ok… if this is the only way for me to atone… ok."

_I listened, enthralled, as Leonie told her lament_:

I was a little rag of a girl, orphaned by my mother's death and my father's hunting trips, which were spurred on by his need to be useful. Except during the brief intervals when he was home and I could pretend to have a family, I was passed around from household to household, a child literally raised by an entire village, but never really feeling part of it. People were kind to me, but it was a kindness born of duty, not of attachment.

That changed when Captain Jeralt arrived. Bandits had come, hearing that the surrounding forests were prime hunting grounds, and kidnapped my father, forcing him to show them where to hunt. House Gloucester, wanting to put the fear of Seiros into any other bandit groups with similar ideas, decided to shell out for the best mercenaries available.

The first thing Jeralt did upon arriving, before even setting up his basecamp in the village, was check on me. He didn't have to, but he chose to. I was hiding up a small tree,

When he found me, he took the bow I was trying to string with shaking hands, put a firm hand on my shoulder, and told me it would be ok… and, for the first time in a long while, I felt ok.

I don't quite know what he saw in me, even now. I'm about the same age as you, so maybe I reminded him of you? I was certainly quieter back then, more withdrawn. Like… Shamir, almost.

_I chuckled a little, imagining Leonie with Shamir's black hair and scowl, but a sharp look from Leonie silenced me. _

Anyway, while he was in the village, your father showed me how to turn my hunting skills into something more. Before, I had stuck to the old paths and set ways, never venturing beyond what was already known. Your father taught me how to find and chart my own path through the forests, how to shatter bandit's weapons with my own, how to disappear into the wild and remain untracked by anybody, even the goddess herself, or so he told me.

He spent a long, careful month in the village, scouting the enemy, planning out his attack just so, in the hopes that my father would come out unscathed. He also ran up an unholy tab at the tavern, not that anyone minded at the time. When he wasn't at the tavern or planning, he was with me.

I… I told him things I hadn't told anyone else. How my mom didn't just slip into the river. I don't know why she did it… but she threw herself in. My dad had told me birthing me was hard on her, that she was unable to have more after me cause of how hard I tore through her. Maybe that was why. She sometimes thought I was a changeling, and her real daughter away in the river with the fey. … I guess she wanted her real daughter back.

I told him how my father, even before that, wasn't sure how to treat me. If I was on Fodlan, he was on the moon in terms of how far he was from me. He didn't abuse me, but everything was a hassle if it was for me… except my birthday. For whatever reason, I always got a gift on my birthday, even if the entire month beforehand he barely even spoke to me.

Maybe that was why your father took to me. Dead mother, distant father… he knew he could be withdrawn, and never wanted to become like my father. He pitied me, and was kind to reassure himself that my father was not him.

Whatever the case… he made me feel special, like I had value. Even if it was pity that drove him, he showed none to me. It was the stern affection of an equal, something I've always craved. I was either below my father and the other adults or above the other children in the eyes of the villagers, never someone on my level. Your father put himself there, talked and listened to me. He even took my advice on his horse.

By the end of the month, Jeralt was ready to strike. I took part in the battle; Jeralt told me it was to be a final test, of sorts, before I could become a full apprentice of his. Before he would, in all but name, adopt me. He said there was someone he really wanted me to meet, which I assume now was you, and that… if I survived this, and the plan went well enough that my father could hunt for the village, a job I had to do in his place, I could travel with him, be his daughter in all but name.

I was, for the first time ever, hopeful.

Unfortunately… _Leonie sighed, regret painted on her face. _Unfortunately, not all went as planned. My father misunderstood what was going on, thought we were other bandits here to take him away, not mercenaries to rescue him and break the bandit stranglehold on deer. Everything went perfectly until, his immediate captors dead, he bolted.

My father is a hunter, not a fighter, so he had no idea how to navigate a battlefield. He made himself an easy target, and the remaining bandits, out of spite, targeted him. He took an arrow to his right elbow, shattering it, and with it, any dreams I had of leaving.

Still… I was glad to see him safe. He was my father, my blood, and I loved him.

After the battle, Jeralt… bless him, he still tried to convince my father to let me go with him. He even paid his tab, and tried to pay the villagers and my father to let me go.

My father, however, said no. He couldn't shoot anymore, not with his arm as mangled as it was, and without a good hunter, the village would have a hard time surviving. If I wanted to go, I'd have to find and train a replacement, as one hired from elsewhere with Jeralt's gold was not guaranteed to be of quality and would require continual payment, which we could not afford. None of the children were old enough to be trained, however, and none of the adults could switch to hunting. We had few enough farmers as is, and taking a strong back away from the fields would have killed us as much as lacking a hunter. Having a skilled hunter was the only way to ensure the village survived, he said, and I hated him for being right.

Your father, seeing that it was a lost cause, couldn't stay any longer, and left for his next assignment. Before he left, however, he told me to find him once I was able to leave, that I had the skills and personality to really make it as a mercenary, with his training. He left me that charm, handcarved for me, as a parting gift, something to keep me going in the years to follow.

It took several years for the other children to become old enough to be properly trained, and longer to get them to anywhere near the skill level I was at. In that time… my dad stopped being distant, and became cruel. He hated being injured. He hated being stuck in the village, when he once ruled the forests, and he took out that hatred on me.

He didn't hit me, but he would belittle me. Told me I would never be as good as him, let alone Captain Jeralt, that my kills were not as clean as his, my deer not as large. He was no longer the father I once knew, but… well, I still took what he said to heart.

Life… was not good for me then. Leonie halted, overwhelmed, and I made to stand up, but she shook her head.

Near the end of my time in the village, I was fishing one day, when … I decided to let myself fall in, near the rapids, where my mother had drowned. Or… I tried to, anyway.

As I was about to fall in, I thought of Captain Jeralt, how much he seemed to believe in me, and how much I didn't want to disappoint him. How much I enjoyed him being my master, at least for a little while. How close I had came to knowing a father figure who, in some way, understood and appreciated, maybe even loved me.

I still fell in, but not to die, merely to cleanse my mind. I came home wet that day, and I think my father knew what I had considered doing. After that, he… while he didn't change, he became something like a father again. He called in every favor he could from his hunting days, called on every bit of sympathy the villagers had, and raised the funds for me to come here.

And… that's why your father meant the world to me.

Leonie finished, her voice cracking. In the background, I heard Sothis softly crying. She mush have woken up during the story and heard enough to know how raw of a deal Leonie had gotten.

And I… I sat there, unsure how to feel, almost too stunned to feel, unsure how to begin to process anything. My face felt warm, and I realized I was crying again.

Leonie took a deep breath.

"Throughout that time… when I knew him, Professor, your father called me Little Lion. I never told anyone else here that… and he never called me that when I ran into him here. So… how did you know to call me that?"

_A/N: As always, comments are welcome. I kept this as canon friendly as possible in Leonie's past; I made additions, not changes, whenever possible.1_

_The next (and actual last) chapter will be posted sometime in the next two weeks. I have a 48 hour DnD session next weekend, but I will hopefully have the chapter mostly done, if not finished, by then._


End file.
